IDAHO SHOOTING RANGE UNDER ATTACK - please help

Local anti-gunners have filed suit against the Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) to stop the agency from making improvements to a public shooting range. The opponents have asked for a permanent injunction not only to prevent IDFG from making improvements to the range, but to prevent the agency from using the property as a shooting range.

The Farragut Shooting Range was built in 1942 for the Farragut Naval Training Center in support of the war effort. The base was decommissioned after the war and came into IDFG ownership in 1950, and has been in continuous use as a public range since that time. The range has hosted state championship competitions, international handgun metallic silhouette competitions, cowboy action events, hunter education classes, hunter sight-in days, youth and ladies shooting clinics, and individual shooters.

The agency's plan is to make long-needed improvements, but not to expand the range as the opponents claim. The opponents contend that there is no local support for the range.

IDFG NEEDS YOUR HELP, especially from state residents, and those living in the Spokane, Wash.- area. Letters of support should be addressed to David Leptich, Regional Wildlife Habitat Biologist, 2750 Kathleen Avenue, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho 83815. Mr. Leptich's e-mail address is: dleptich@idfg.idaho.gov.

IDFG needs to hear from both individual shooters and organized shooters who can have one of their officers write a letter, reference the size of their membership, and voice support for the project.

I'm there, Bro. I'm a good ways south of you, but I have a loud voice.;)
Biker

ID_shooting

January 29, 2006, 02:59 PM

message sent it IDFG and state reps

Double Naught Spy

January 29, 2006, 04:04 PM

So rick_reno, why didn't you post why the folks want the range closed? All you said was that it was by anti-gunners and basically that there was no basis for rennovation because there is no local support for the range as claimed by those who don't want it.

So basically, you have presented an incomplete and unrepresentative story that anti-gunners want the range closed for no apparent reason other than lack of support. This is not the case.

It isn't that they are anti-gunners who don't want the range and claim there isn't support for the range, but locals on neighboring properties that feel the range is a nusance because of the noise generated from the discharge of firearms. Promoters of the range say they are trying to be good neighbors and bending over backwards to be good neighbors and so they will alter the range over the next 10 years to prevent noise leakage into the surrounding areas which at the same time expanding the the overall size of the range.

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/tools/story_pf.asp?ID=52786

Undoubtedly, the local who are against the range don't believe the good faith claims of noise abatement and don't think that expanding the size of the range to allow for more shooters and shooting activities will help lower sound levels at all. The noise issue has been a problem for years and the locals haven't exactly been convinced the range will put in the sound abatement as needed as they haven't done it previously, plus the sound abatement aspect isn't going to be the first part of the rennovation. So that means the sound problem will likely get worse over the next 10 years before it gets better.

Oh, and let me be the first to compliment you on the timeliness of your post. You are just a few days shy of being 1 full year late. This story came out on 8 Feb 2005...
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4186/is_20050208/ai_n11713378

So instead of a call to action by fellow gun owners to help this poor range, how about telling us how things turned out?

Let me help you. They lost, probably because they didn't get enough support soon enough. The vote was 90 to 11 back in May of 2005.

http://www.farragutpark.org/riflerange.htm

7.62x54r

January 29, 2006, 04:12 PM

So why do they want to close the range down.:confused:

rick_reno

January 29, 2006, 05:53 PM

They want the range shut down because of noise complaints. Bayview, the community near the range has had a lot of growth - like much of N. Idaho - and many of the new residents want the range closed.

Double Naught Spy - the lawsuit mentioned in the article was filed recently. Unfortunately, my crystal ball is down and so I can't tell you the outcome now. Maybe I should switch to tea leaves - let me know if you think they'll work. This battle over this range has been going on for over two years. "Locals" - using your terminlogy - might not mean the same thing in Idaho as it does in Texass. The "locals" who want the range closed are recent transplants - many from California. This has been a shooting range in operation since 1942, there has never been a problem mentioned until the recent arrivals started complaining. Lastly, I don't see the requirement for presenting the anti-gun side of arguements here. You can write a letter/send email supporting either side. I suggest you do that.

cliffstanc

January 30, 2006, 02:41 AM

Let me help you. They lost, probably because they didn't get enough support soon enough. The vote was 90 to 11 back in May of 2005.
http://www.farragutpark.org/riflerange.htm
No, they didn't "lose". That vote was taken by the Bayview Chamber of Commerce. Does the Bayview Chamber of Commerce control the Farragut State Park? Not the last time I checked. No, the vote was to put Bayview "on record" as opposing the range project. That's all.

This story isn't that old, either. As far as I can tell, it's still going forward and protests are still being lodged. Google news shows a story dated Jan 7th:http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D8F04HAOA.html

Perhaps Rick_Reno should have included more information in his original post, but if you're going to criticize someone for getting the facts wrong you should get your own ducks in a row too.

- Cliff

Double Naught Spy

January 30, 2006, 12:58 PM

Cool, okay so they lost the chamber vote but not the final decision.

As far as the story not being old and getting all one's ducks in a row, cliffstanc, I am exactly correct that the story rick_reno posted was from 8 Feb 2005. And as you noted, rick_reno didn't post his sources and so we could not see into what he was driving at or the basis for his plea for help. So when I checked the story, I found it was published in Feb '05. That hardly seems to be any sort of emergency when the plea for help is based specifically on a story that is one year old.

rick_reno, so no crystal ball and no tea leaves, but do you think you could post information with souces so that folks could verify things? Do you think you could do like cliffstanc and actually post information that wasn't a year old? Cliff did good and found a more relevant source, but when you post a plea for help on some pending gun disaster issue and the information you post is actually a year old, then something isn't right. It makes me wonder why you would not post something more relevant chronologically.

So the story was a year old that you posted. You didn't post any sources for current information and you presented the year old story as if it was current. On top of that, the justification you gave for the CARE people wanting to stop the expansion and close the range was misrepresented. As I pointed out and you verified, it was largely due to the noise issue.

We are all pro gun here, but we end up looking bad when we do these battle cries for a call to arms and then scramble the information in various manners that actually deceives those who are your allies with what is essentially a propoganda-like basis. Why, rick_reno, would you tell us

Local anti-gunners have filed suit against the Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) to stop the agency from making improvements to a public shooting range. The opponents have asked for a permanent injunction not only to prevent IDFG from making improvements to the range, but to prevent the agency from using the property as a shooting range.
...
The opponents contend that there is no local support for the range.

but not tell us that the reason they want the range shut down was because of the noise? It is also the local traffic, but mostly the noise. That was the sum total of the justification you gave to the CARE side of the argument and that misrepresented their argument. Why not simply provide us with proper information that the local land owners purchased their properties fairly inexpensively, in part because of the local range, put in developments where people purchased houses knowing there was an active gun range nearby, and after making their purchases decided to start complaining about the noise because of their moronic decision to buy land next to a range.

The sad part is that you have classified all those folks as being anti-gun because they don't want the range located next to them. That is about like classifying people as anti car because they don't want an oil refinery next to their property or anti sanitation or anti water because they don't want a wastewater sewage treatment plant next to them. Just because they don't want that gun range where it is does not make them anti gun. You have set up a dichotomy that is inappropriate and have done so to help rally all the pro gun folks to the cause. That makes it propoganda.

The type of situation that exists refers to the local folks who don't like the range as NIMBYs. NIMBY stands for Not In My Back Yard. There are basically 2 types of NIMBY people. You basically have the indigenous NIMBYs that were present before the offending envionmental entity was present and the post environmental entity NIMBYs who came into the area after the offending entity was present. Since such entities are often placed away from major population centers, as was this gun range, the indigenous NIMBYs are usually few in number and unable to mount significant effort to stop such entities. So now 60 years later, those folks aren't even alive and so the NIMBYs complaining are Johnny-come-latelies. That is what the CARE people are. What makes these bad is that they can muster enough effort to stop work, cancel projects, etc. Of the two groups of NIMBYs, they are the ones with the less justified claims because they came into the area knowing about the offending entity.

We are all on the same side. If you want help with such matters, then don't convert real and valid information into propoganda so as to make the gun side of the argument stronger. We get that crap from MMM already. We also get it from the NRA. Hell, we have gotten it from probably every President of the US, at least the last 5 (in my life) and regardless of party, does anybody ever really trust the President to provide the American public with fully accurate and representative information? Nope. So it is hard to put faith into your cause when you have done the same thing.

Creeping Incrementalism

January 30, 2006, 01:39 PM

I don't agree that the original post is propoganda, and I disagree that you can't call these people anti-gun.

If someone moves next to a freeway and starts complaining about car noise, and makes legal efforts to stop expansion of lanes or to get the freeway shut down altogether, I think it's pretty safe to assume that they are anti-car, pro-public transit neo-hippies. That's what's happening here, except with a range and guns. And anyway, I doubt it's really the noise that bothers people, it's the fact that the punctuated noise reminds people that guns are being shot nearby.

I'm sure a few of these people are indifferent on guns and just don't like the noise, but this is most definitely a gun issue, for all the usual reasons. When anti-gunners want to shut down a range, they will always use "noise" as an excuse if there's anyone within earshot.

If I were Rick Reno, I would have mentioned noise, though, just for idle amusement as the petty excuse the anti-gunners are using. But his post isn't close to propoganda. We've heard the gun-grabbers excuses before and it can be a waste of time to remind everyone of them everysingle time. When they want to shut down a range, it's always either noise, and/or the lead environmental issue.

As an aside, I know a contractor who is leaving California because of the unfriendly business climate. He was thinking of Oregon, but now is having second thoughts because it looks to be becoming a true blue state, and was thinking of Idaho instead. Maybe I should tell him to keep looking...

GruntII

January 30, 2006, 08:36 PM

There is federal case law to support the range. It involves askeet range in Childersburg Alabama being sued by a apartment housing Developemt built next to the range well after the range was established. The Case went all the way to one of the federal appelate courts. I'd start with the 11 Circuit Court of Appeals Use Childersburg as a search term and check FindLaw.com for the case. I'll try and find the name of theskeet club out and post it.
The Short of it is the Courts found that the range was there first and people who build around ranges have to expect the sound of gunfire.

bumm

January 30, 2006, 09:32 PM

>The Short of it is the Courts found that the range
> was there first and people who build around
> ranges have to expect the sound of gunfire.

Absolutely. I think that this is the most important aspect of the entire case. It's rediculous for people to move to a new area and then expect the area to change to their liking.
Marty

Al Norris

January 31, 2006, 02:59 AM

00Spy, I like how even you characterized the "debate" as propaganda.

They want the range closed because they moved to Idaho to get away from ________(fill it in), and now as the population increases, they find the "noise" burdensome. Kinda like how city folk move out to the country and complain about the smell of the dairy next door. The diary that was there years before they were.

My, my. How politically correct can you be?

Oh, and should we talk about the "environmental" issues stemming from the new construction on that range? Oh My! They are cutting down some trees!

I've lived in Idaho for just short of 25 years. It's only been in the last 10 years that the newcomers have really been pushing their agenda in changing our state into something that resembles the one they left.